SECRECY & GOVERNMENT BULLETIN

Issue Number 54
November 1995

Intelligence Facilities Uncovered on Internet

The existence and location of several unacknowledged U.S.
intelligence facilities were reported for the first time on
Internet newsgroups in October. The identification of a CIA
facility at 1517 Westbranch Drive in Tysons Corner, Virginia,
precipitated additional disclosures of intelligence facilities
belonging to the CIA, the National Security Agency, the National
Reconnaissance Office and other agencies.

The disclosures (on newsgroups such as alt.politics.org.cia)
represent a qualitatively new development of the Internet as a
vehicle of public expression, and a new type of challenge to
government security policies, which have been slow to meet public
expectations of reform.

It is generally agreed that there is an excessive level of
secrecy surrounding many intelligence facilities. The Joint
Security Commission reported in early 1994 that although "there
are many valid reasons for the special cover measures used by some
military and intelligence organizations, ... the use of cover to
conceal the existence of a government facility... is broader than
necessary and significantly increases costs.... Special
protection generally should focus on the most sensitive uses of a
facility, rather than the fact of its existence." The Commission
recommended that cover should be rescinded except where there is
"a documented covert intelligence or operational mission."
(Redefining Security, pp. 19-20).

More than a year and a half later, no identifiable progress
has been made toward implementing this common-sense
recommendation.

Significantly, the recent disclosures did not result from a
leak of classified information, but from a bottom-up effort by
interested citizens which provided general public access to
information which had previously been local folklore. The "group
mind" on the Internet devised an effective search strategy, which
led to the identification of the Westbranch Drive site (apparently
a component of the CIA Directorate of Science and Technology).
This in turn led to the identification of several other
facilities, scouted out mainly by John Pike of FAS.

While many commenters on the Internet newsgroups applauded
the disclosures as an appropriate response to excessive secrecy
and contributed their own information and insights, others warned
that identifying concealed intelligence facilities was a reckless
and presumptuous act that could lead to no good. The ensuing
debate about the proper role of secrecy and the need to demystify
the intelligence community was livelier and more substantive than
most recent Congressional hearings on intelligence.

In response to an S&GB query, the CIA declined to comment on
the specific disclosures but noted generally on October 27 that
"The shooting murders of two CIA employees in January 1993
reinforced CIA's long-standing practice of acknowledging only our
headquarters building in McLean, Virginia as a CIA facility....
With the increase in domestic terrorist attacks, our serious
concern for the physical safety and well-being of our employees
motivates us to continue our practice of not acknowledging
facilities other than the headquarters compound. Of course, the
Congressional intelligence and appropriations committees are privy
to comprehensive and detailed information about the location,
purpose, occupancy, and cost of CIA facilities as part of their
oversight functions."

Automatic Declassification Under Attack

Declassification of the huge backlog of 25 year old secret
documents could be jeopardized by congressional criticism of the
automatic declassification requirements of executive order 12958,
which took effect on October 16.

In report language on the 1996 energy and water
appropriations bill (H. Rep. 104-293), conferees claimed that
automatic declassification of national security information would
inevitably lead to the uncontrolled release of Restricted Data,
i.e. nuclear weapons design information that is protected under
the Atomic Energy Act.

In reality, the executive order already provides a specific
exemption for Restricted Data in order to prevent any such
inadvertent release, along with a generous 5 year implementation
period to seek out exempted documents.

Nevertheless, prompted by the Department of Energy, the
congressional conferees said they "do not see how such an
exemption can be effectively implemented since the national
security information records slated for automatic release have a
high probability of containing some Restricted Data intermixed
with the national security information."

This is nonsense, according to Steven Garfinkel of the
Information Security Oversight Office. "There is no justification
for the idea that hidden Restricted Data is spread throughout
these files. Hundreds of millions of pages of national security
information have been declassified over the last 25 years,
including bulk declassified, and there has been no indication of
any proliferation problem attributable to their release,"
Garfinkel said October 30. Moreover, DOE never made any
suggestion to the contrary during the two year development of the
new Order, he noted.

The conferees called on the President to revise the executive
order so as to exempt all files that "potentially" contain
Restricted Data. This notion of "potential" Restricted Data
amounts to a new classification category that has no clear
boundaries. If accepted by the President, it could render
automatic declassification practically impossible, leading right
back to the Reagan era of open-ended secrecy.

The other outstanding threat to the new Order was the House
Intelligence Committee's attempt to restrict funding for
declassification. But at the end of October, the authorization
bill containing this provision was stalled, due to a bizarre move
by Rep. Newt Gingrich to insert funding for a "covert" program to
overthrow the government of Iran. (Congressional Quarterly,
10/28/95, p. 3320).

Setting Global Standards for Openness

For better and for worse, the United States sets the world
standard for openness and accountability in national security
affairs. Consequently, efforts to eliminate unnecessary secrecy
may have global impacts far beyond their immediate domestic
context.

"The United States currently has the most open intelligence
services in world history," the CIA advised S&GB on October 27.
But it is simultaneously true that the U.S. has the most secretive
intelligence and national security bureaucracy in the world.
Because it spends vastly more money on secret programs than any
other nation, and has done so over a fifty year period, the U.S.
has accumulated an inventory of secrets whose scope and volume can
hardly be imagined.

The demise of the Soviet Union, Edward Teller has observed,
"puts the United States in the uncomfortable position of holding
the record in secrecy. It is urgent that we do something about
this situation." (Issues in Science and Technology, Fall 1992, p.
6).

It is doubly urgent because foreign countries look to the
United States to define the limits of what is possible in
achieving open, accountable government. In some instances,
American policies provide a source of moral authority to
dissidents who are seeking to open up their own governments. In
other cases, U.S. secrecy policies serve as a template for foreign
governments who are creating their own security structures. Last
month, for example, the head of a new South African Parliament
committee on intelligence oversight said that one of his
committee's first tasks will be to study the system of oversight
that is applied in the U.S. (FBIS-AFR-95-204, 10/23/95, pp. 8-
10).

The limits of U.S. leadership in secrecy reform can be sensed
in foreign news stories like "Government secrecy hampers a legal
battle waged by nuclear reactor staff against the employer they
say gave them cancer" from the Israeli biweekly The Jerusalem
Report (11/2/95, pp. 20-21). It is hard to read this story
without recalling the lawsuit concerning the secret facility at
Groom Lake, Nevada, where the government insists that all evidence
of possible environmental crimes is a state secret. On September
29, President Clinton issued a Presidential Determination
declaring that "it is in the paramount interest of the United
States" to exempt the site from disclosure of any information the
Air Force says is classified. (Federal Register, 10/10/95, p.
52823). The Air Force in turn says that it cannot acknowledge the
presence of jet fuel, paint or car batteries at the site without
"risking American lives."

Secret Human Experimentation at CIA

The recent Final Report of the Advisory Committee on Human
Radiation Experiments provides informative new background material
on the abuse of classification for non-national security purposes,
the practice of active public deception, and the continuing
conflict between secrecy and environmental laws.

The impressive Report also makes a number of interesting
observations about the role of the CIA in human experimentation
programs including the following:

"The CIA indicated that it is currently performing classified
human research projects. The agency informed the ... Committee
that all human subjects are informed of the CIA's sponsorship and
of the specific nature of the study in which they are
participating, even if the general purposes of the research are
classified." (p. 686).

"The CIA... reported that it was unable to retrieve any
records of its participation in the midcentury DOD panels that met
in secret to discuss, among other things, human experiments" (p.
646). "The Advisory Committee recommends... that the CIA's
record-keeping system be reviewed to ensure that records
maintained by that agency are accessible upon legitimate request
from the public or governmental sources." (p. 837).

"The Advisory Committee recommends that all records of the
CIA bearing on programs of secret human research, such as MKULTRA
and the related CIA human behavior projects from the late 1940s
through the early 1970s, including Bluebird, Artichoke, MKSEARCH,
MKDELTA, Naomi, Chance, Often, and Chickwit, become a top priority
for declassification review with the expectation that most, if not
all, of these documents can be declassified and made available to
the public." (p. 838).

The 925 page Final Report of the Advisory Committee on Human
Radiation Experiments (stock number 061-000-00-848-9) can be
purchased for $44 from the Government Printing Office at (202)512-
1800.

Intelligence Muzak Reform at NSA

The quality of the background music that is piped into the
National Security Agency has improved lately, according to an NSA
employee writing in the internal NSA Newsletter (October 1995,
page 11):

"I'd like to take time out to commend the organization that
provides us with the background music that we listen to each day
as we go about our tasks. The quality of the music has improved
tremendously since I came on board 7 years ago. I am a Beatles
fan, but I remember hearing 'Penny Lane' 20 times a day-- every
day (well maybe not 20, but it sure felt like it!) and that was
more than anyone should have to suffer. Now, we have a variety of
good music-- everything from Jonathan Butler to Bonnie Raitt to The
Judds. In my opinion, it is a small thing that made a positive
impact on employee productivity. Once again, I'd like to say
thank you to our 'NSA DJ' for adding a bit of sweetness to our
days."

Bulletins

"A Framework for Reform of the U.S. Intelligence Community,"
the exceptionally informative paper by John A. Gentry, is now
available on the FAS intelligence reform homepage at
http://www.fas.org/irp/.

The U.S. intelligence community maintains about 400 liaison
relationships with foreign intelligence and law enforcement
organizations, said former acting DCI Admiral William Studeman at
an October 19 meeting of the American Bar Association. "We are
all each other's partners," he said, "and we are all each other's
targets." Intelligence operations with foreign liaison services
are typically not reported to Congress and "have been the source
of problems," according to Senator Robert Kerrey.

On September 26, the DCI and the Secretary of Defense moved
to eliminate the classification marking NOFORN, i.e. Not
Releasable to Foreign Nationals. This follows the decision last
April [see S&GB 48] to eliminate WNINTEL (Warning Notice -
Intelligence Sources or Methods Involved) and NOCONTRACT (Not
Releasable to Contractors/ Consultants). Elimination of obsolete
classification markings is intended to facilitate the often
arduous dissemination of intelligence information.

Secrecy & Government Bulletin is written by Steven Aftergood
and published by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), a 50
year old public interest organization of natural and social
scientists concerned with issues of science and society. The FAS
Project on Government Secrecy is supported by grants from the HKH
Foundation and the CS Fund.